by Meg Maxwell
He glanced at her and squeezed her hand and released it, and she knew it was time to go.
Getting out of his car and walking away was the hardest thing she’d ever done.
Chapter Fifteen
Colt watched Anna walk toward the front door, his heart splitting again. The door opened and her aunt and cousin rushed out to greet her and wrap her in hugs. Colt put his sunglasses back on and quickly backed out of the drive and went up the long dirt road that led out of the community.
Sharp pokes in the region of his heart had him pulling over to the side of the road to take a breath and collect himself.
He loved her and he was leaving her. That made no damn sense. And yet it did. It took everything in him to start the car and keep driving away, farther and farther from his Anna. From his heart.
He wasn’t in any shape to drive into Houston traffic, so he parked in Grass Creek and got out of the car, needing a strong cup of coffee. There were Amish people here and there, heading toward the market. He could believe that the woman he just spent a week with in Blue Gulch had been one of them not very long ago.
He continued walking, stopping in the coffee shop for a cappuccino, then passed the pet shop where Harlan had bought the guinea pig that had started everything. He backed up.
Wait a minute.
Another black-and-white guinea pig was in the window with two friends, a cinnamon-and-white long-haired guinea pig and another that was mostly white. His heart squeezed at the sight of the black-and-white critter. Because of your kind, I fell in love and now I’m a mess, he said silently, pointing a finger at the guinea pig in the window.
And before he could stop himself, he went in and bought it. And a cage. And wood shavings. And food. And a hidey tunnel. And a how-to-take-care-of-your-new-guinea-pig book. Not for himself. As a Christmas gift for Anna’s little cousin, Sadie.
He drove back to the Amish village and parked by Anna’s aunt and uncle’s house. Before he could even open the door, they all came out, Sadie’s red pigtails flying behind her as she rushed out the door, the group of them staring at the Englisher in the FBI-agent shades. He took them off and put them in his pocket.
Anna’s expression was so full of pain and longing that he almost rushed to her to hold her, to assure her that he felt as horribly as she did, but what could they do? This was how it had to be.
He cleared his throat. “I have a Christmas present for Sadie, if it’s all right with you, Kate and Eli.”
Sadie’s eyes widened. “A gift for me?” She looked at her parents, waiting for their approval. Or lack of it.
“Well, go see what it is,” Eli said.
Sadie ran over to the car and looked in the passenger seat. She covered her mouth with her hands and tears began pouring down her cheeks. She stood there and sobbed.
“Good Lord, what is it?” Kate said, rushing over with her husband.
Anna trailed behind them. She peered in the car and Colt could see the tears misting in her beautiful driftwood-colored eyes.
“Can I keep him, Mamm and Daed?” Sadie asked, the pleading in her voice almost unbearable. Tears still streamed down her cheeks.
“If you want the critter, why are you sobbing?” her father asked.
“Because I want him so bad.” She dropped down on her knees, burying her face in her hands.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, kinder,” Eli said, pulling her up. “Go get your guinea pig. He’s probably hungry.”
Sadie stared at her father, her face brightening. She wrapped her arms around him, then her mother, then Anna, then Colt, catching him by surprise.
“If it’s okay with you, Mr. Colt, I’m going to name him Agent Sparkles.”
“Agent Sparkles?” Kate said. “Is that an English name?”
Colt glanced at Anna. She smiled, then laughed. He smiled back, wanting to take her in his arms and hold her so badly it hurt, but he stayed where he was.
“Agent Sparkles is a good English name,” Anna said. “If that’s all right with you, Onkel and Aenti.”
Eli raised an eyebrow. “Well, it’s Sadie’s present so she can name the cute guinea pig whatever she wants.”
“There’s a big bag of wood shavings for his cage. And in the other bag is everything you need, plus a book on how to take care of a guinea pig.”
“Thank you, Agent Colt,” Sadie said. “Thank you so much. You can come visit him whenever you want. I can’t wait to read the book.”
Colt kneeled down in front of Sadie. “You’re very welcome. And Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas,” Sadie said. “Will you help me carry him into my room?” she asked her parents.
Eli took the cage while Kate took the big sack of shavings and Sadie carried the bag with the food, the tunnel and the book.
“That was very thoughtful of you, Colt,” Anna said when her family had gone inside the house. “But that’s the Colt Asher I know. Not the one who’s afraid of what might happen. Or afraid to accept that he’s human.”
“I love you too much to let you down,” he said.
“You’re letting me down anyway,” she said, rushing over to him. She slipped both hands to his face, holding his gaze. “Do you understand that? You’re letting me down by walking away. I’m telling you I’m in this. I know who you are. I know what you do. Based on everything you know about me, are you telling me I can’t handle it?”
“I can’t handle it,” he said.
“So we’re in love but you’re walking away. Oh, that makes sense.”
“Goodbye, Anna,” he said, then got in his car and drove away, tears stinging his eyes.
* * *
Colt spent the rest of the day Christmas shopping for his sister, Chris and the twins, constantly seeing gifts he knew Anna would love. He had to stop thinking about her. He had to put his mind on hyperfocus. Christmas. His family. Making calls to Blue Gulch to say “Merry Christmas” and “Happy New Year.” Then it was the Duvall crime organization for the foreseeable future.
He tossed and turned all night, unable to stop thinking about her, wondering what she was doing, what her Christmas Eve meal had been, what she’d gotten Sadie as a gift.
In the morning, he got up early and worked out in the condo’s gym, then took a long hot shower and carted all the presents to his car for the short drive over to his sister’s.
He’d bought the twins way too much. Something called Jumperoos that hung from a doorway and let them bounce-jump to their hearts’ content. Two exersaucers. Two baby-sized leather bomber jackets that he couldn’t resist. He’d gotten Cathy tickets to a concert he knew she’d want, and Chris tickets to the hockey championships. They’d gotten him flying lessons, something he’d always wanted to do. Noah and Nathaniel had gotten him a joint gift, a T-shirt that said Texas’s Best Uncle.
He froze, the navy T-shirt limp in his hand in his sister’s family room.
Cathy frowned. “Colt? You hate it? It’s adorable.”
Colt stood up and walked over to the sliding glass door to the backyard, where Chris was playing peekaboo with the twins in their baby swings as he pushed one at a time. “It’s very cute. But it’s not true. I’m the worst uncle, Cathy.”
“What are you talking about? How happy do those twins look to you?”
He turned back to Cathy and launched into the whole story. Starting with Harlan and Sparkles. Explaining the whole mess with leaving Nathaniel in the restaurant. And ending with breaking up with Anna, who he loved like crazy.
“Oh, Colt. You think I never left one of the twins somewhere by accident? I once left Noah in a shopping cart in the supermarket while I loaded my car with bags of groceries, then drove halfway home before I realized he was still in the cart in the store vestibule. It had been raining that day so I figured I’d leave him for a minute
while I ran to the car, parked right where I could see the cart. I completely forgot to go back.”
He stared at her. “What? Really? That’s terrible.”
She lightly punched him in the arm. “I know. But it happens. Only that once. But it happens. Chris admitted he’d once left Noah at his best friend’s house, thinking both boys were in their car seats. He’d gotten all the way home and didn’t realize it until he saw the empty car seat.”
Huh. He hadn’t expected to hear any of that. “I felt like hell about it. To me it means I can’t make everything in my life fit. If I want to be a good agent, I need to be hyperfocused on being an agent. I can’t be in love. I can’t be thinking of my girlfriend finding out I’m injured or dead. I need to be one-hundred-percent on the job.”
“Being one-hundred-percent focused on something will just burn you out. And one night, you’ll come home from a case that’s done a number on you and you’ll have nothing and no one. You’ll be alone in the truest sense of the world, Colt. Self-imposed loneliness.”
He shrugged. “It’s worked so far.”
“Oh, really? What about Anna? The woman you fell madly in love with?”
“I don’t know how to have everything, Cath. I don’t want her to get hurt.”
“Or maybe you don’t,” Cathy said pointedly. “Dad was always disappointing us, making promises and not keeping them. I think we both learned not to expect, not to hope, not to dream. And how we lost them... I was afraid to love anyone after that. Even you, Colt. And we’re all we had.”
They’d both been distant with each other after they lost their parents. Defense mechanisms. But the birth of the twins had brought them closer. Thank God.
“I tried not to fall for Chris when we met,” Cathy continued. “But he kept at me until he broke down my defenses. Like Anna did for you.”
“And so what is it like?” Colt asked. “How do you give everything your all?”
“It took me a while to figure out how to make all the important pieces of my life fit. How to have time for Chris, how to give the babies the time each need individually and together, how to have time for myself. How to have time for my brother. I take yoga every day, Colt. Every day without fail. And while I’m there, I’m focused on twisting my body into uncomfortable positions. I don’t think of the boys. I don’t think of Chris. I just breathe.”
Colt nodded, a tiny crack breaking open inside him. His sister’s words were getting through—or maybe they were just making sense to him in terms of her life.
“Colt, do you know why I left the boys with you?”
“Because you had no choice.”
“Are you kidding? Chris’s parents are a half hour away and they’re a little spacey, but they could have taken the twins for the week—and would have. But I wanted you to take Noah and Nathaniel. I wanted you to know them in a way you only can if you spend twenty-four/seven with them. I want you to be close to them, Colt, and I saw the opportunity and took it. You mad?”
“Are you kidding? My life changed because of it. I fell in love with my Amish nanny—who is now formerly Amish.”
“Go get her, Colt. Put both of you out of your misery on Christmas day for God’s sake.”
Colt smiled. “Why is my younger sister so much wiser than I am?”
“It’s the woman thing,” she said. “We’re just smarter in all ways.”
“Don’t I know it.” He hugged her tight, kissed his nephews and ran out the door.
* * *
Anna was up early on Christmas day, working in the barn on painting some wooden dolls that Kate wanted to give her neighbors, who had a houseful of little girls. She left their faces unpainted, as was the Amish style. The girls would see who they wanted, who they envisioned in the dolls.
She’d spent Christmas Eve with her family, trying to forget her broken heart, trying not to think of the man she loved and missed so much she couldn’t breathe. Being home was a comfort, but at the same time, this village wasn’t home anymore. She belonged in the English world and tomorrow, she’d be moving to Houston, staying in a hotel until she found an apartment of her own. She planned to get a job as a nurse’s aide at the hospital where she’d said goodbye to both her parents, and hopefully, she would be accepted into Houston College and the department of nursing. It helped to think of her plan, her goals. But then her pain would sneak up on her and knock her to her knees.
She missed him so much and she’d just seen him yesterday. Sadie hadn’t stopped talking about Agent Sparkles or how kind Colt was and how she’d never forget what he did for her.
Anna wouldn’t, either.
Kate had asked if there was something between her and the FBI agent, and Anna had told her aunt the truth: yes, but it was over now. Her aenti had hugged her tight and said she was sorry and that maybe it would all work out.
Anna wasn’t one to give up on hope, but Colt wouldn’t even be around starting tomorrow—and he’d vowed not to think of Anna when he was at work and out in the field. It would be out of sight, out of mind, and by the time the case was over, she’d be a distant memory. Remember that time you fell for the Amish woman on her rumspringa? Crazy, huh?
Tears poked at her eyes and she forced herself to focus on finishing the last doll. She’d just set her to dry when she heard the sound of a car on gravel outside the barn.
A car. On Christmas day.
Colt?
She bolted up and looked out the barn window. It was Colt!
Please be here to say you’ve come to your senses. Please don’t be here to say a final goodbye. I can’t take it.
She walked outside, realizing he stood in the same spot he did when she’d first laid eyes on him a week ago.
“Merry Christmas,” he said.
Dear God, was that why he was here? To wish her a happy holiday. She didn’t think she could bear this another moment. “Merry Christmas,” she said after a long pause.
He dropped down on one knee, holding a little black box in his hand. A ring box.
She gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.
He opened the box. A beautiful diamond ring glittered in the morning sun. “I bought this ring in the jewelry shop in Blue Gulch the day I played basketball with Devin and helped him realize a few truths. I realized a few truths that day, too. The biggest one being that I loved you, Anna. I knew I wanted you in my life forever. So I marched into the jewelry shop and bought the one ring that I thought you’d love more than any other. And then I forgot my nephew in the restaurant, and I buried the ring in my luggage.”
She was trying very hard not to burst into tears. She really didn’t want to distract him from continuing.
“All I need to know is that I love you more than anything, Anna. Anything. Will you marry me?”
She flung herself at him, knocking him over onto the grass. “Yes. Yes. Yes!”
They sat up and he faced her, sliding the ring on her finger. “I’m sorry I had a crisis of...I don’t know—faith in myself, you, humanity. Everything. I love you, Anna. I can’t live without you. That’s what I know.”
For a moment she was speechless and could barely find her breath. Her wish had come true. Her Christmas wish. Her lifetime wish. “I feel the same way.”
He held her tight. “I also need you to know that I am going undercover tomorrow. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. But I need to get Duvall off the street. I need to be an agent. It’s who I am.”
“I know. Just like I need to become a trauma nurse. I’ve got my own life, Colt. And while you’re doing your thing, I’ll be doing mine.”
He pulled her up, wrapping her in his arms. “We’re in this together, Anna. I don’t have to be a lone wolf. I finally understand that. We’re a we.”
She was so happy she could barely find her breath. “I love you, Colt Asher.”
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“I love you,” he said, kissing her full on the lips. “Merry Christmas, Anna.”
“The merriest,” she said.
Epilogue
It was a beautiful day for a wedding. The first day of spring was bright and sunny, and the forecast was for a warm seventy-two degrees. The sky was blue without a hint of clouds, and there wasn’t a drop of humidity in the air. “A good hair day,” as Anna’s new English friends would say.
The entire village had been invited to Anna and Colt’s wedding, taking place in the field adjacent to her house. Everyone had gathered, including her former best friend, Caleb, who was now married himself to a lovely Amish woman, and Jordan Lapp and his fiancée, Abigail, to erect the tent and set up the tables. The Amish had cooked all the food and the best of the singers among them would provide song, if not music.
Anna had surprised herself by wanting to be married in her village. She felt it was honoring her heritage, who she’d been, as she set out on this new journey of who she was. There were a few conditions on both sides—the bishop had drawn the line at music, but singing was fine, of course. Anna had insisted photographs be allowed and a videographer, too.
Anna had informed Eli and Kate that she’d invited her cousin Mara and her boyfriend and that the two of them were to sit among the family, be welcomed back for the day, and treated with love and respect. Tears had come to Eli’s eyes; Mara was his niece, who he’d continued to pray for, and the bishop had agreed since he’d never known Mara anyway and hardly anyone remembered her except her own family, and Anna, Eli, Kate and Sadie were it. Over the past few months, Anna had spent more time with Mara and she was thrilled her cousin would be part of her wedding day.
Now, Anna was putting on the final touches in her bedroom in her house, which she’d donated to the village for use as a temporary housing for anyone who might need it, including those unsure of where their hearts lay, with the Amish or the English. She glanced at herself in the standing full-length mirror that she’d brought over and smuggled inside for the occasion.